Christmas at home

Welcome back! I hope ya'll had many delicious moments during the break.

To kick off a new year of blogging, I thought it would only make sense to firstly conclude 2008 with my family Christmas dinner.

It was a little chaotic at the start, with me doing too many things at once; whipping up the meringue, cutting and peeling vegetables, wrapping the last minute presents and more. But once the vegetables were sliced, fruits were cut up and meringues were baking, everything started to fall into place. Phew!

We started with some dips and crackers, then a giant seafood platter. I tried really hard not to over-cook this year. The following fed 7 adults and 1 kid... we had a few prawns leftover, as well as half the mashed potato and half the salad. I think I did fairly well!

Seafood platter with smoked salmon, shaved Spanish onion, dill and capers, prawns with 3 dipping sauces, fresh oysters with lime, lobsters and spicy wedges

Meringues baking in oven

Berries for the pavlova -strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, kiwi fruit and passionfrut

I forgot to photograph the wagyu which we bought from Vic's Meat, but it's marbling was delectable! We chargrilled these eggplants, sweet potatoes and asparagus on the side. These were simply prepared with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil and cracked pepper.

Vegetables for chargrilling

Mixed green salad with dill, cucumber, haloumi cheese, anchovy stuffed olives, cherry tomatoes and balsamic dressing

The baby carrots were caramelised with a combination of butter, brown sugar and parsley.

Caramelised carrots

Rosemary mashed potato

Charcoal and flame

Meringues are simple to bake and require minimal ingredients. This is the recipe I used:

8 egg whites
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
2 cups of caster sugar
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoon cornflower
2 teaspoon white vinegar
Fruit and double cream to serve

1. Preheat oven to 120°C, whip up the egg whites and until stiff peaks form.
2. Slowly (spoon by spoon) add sugar while continuously beating the egg whites.
3. Once sugar has dissolved, all remaining ingredients and combine well.
4. Spoon onto baking paper into required sizes / shapes and bake for 90 minutes or until crisp.
5. Leave them in the oven with the door ajar to allow cooling.
6. Serve with fruit (I used strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, passionfruit and kiwifruit) and double cream.

Pavlova

Happy New Year!